The post office and its story an interesting account of the activities of a great government department

Then in 1840 came the contract with the Cunard Company to carry the mails for the British Government, and the history of that company has been a continuous breaking of records and of improvement in services. The names of the huge vessels belonging to this company which have successively lowered the Atlantic record are familiar to most of us, and they belong in a special way to the story of the Post Office. There was the Britannia in 1840, which began with a voyage of fourteen days, and the China in 1862 and the Batavia in 1870 reduced this record considerably. Then followed in 1881 the Servia, the first of the modern type of vessel; in 1884 the Umbria and Etruria with speeds of 19 knots an hour; in 1893 the Campania and Lucania with 22 knots; and in 1895 the Lusitania and Mauretania with 25 knots. The record has now been reduced to considerably under five days. The present contract is for a weekly service to the United States via Liverpool and New York. The British Post Office only pays its contractors for the weight of mails actually carried, and reserves the right to send specially addressed letters by foreign ships: most famous among these are the vessels of the Hamburg-American line, which have at different times held the Atlantic record. The White Star line has also since 1877 been regularly employed by contract to carry the mails between Liverpool and New York, and the Teutonic and the Majestic, completed in 1889 and 1890, were the first merchant ships constructed with a view to their use as auxiliaries to the British navy.